Dedicated to the gastronomic decadence of Newcastle’s most wonderful cafe!

About/FAQ

Belle and Herbs

Belle & Herbs is a cafe in the Heaton area of Newcastle. They’re open from around 9am – 6pm most days, with slightly shorter hours on a Sunday. They serve a fantastic array of breakfasts and after 12pm also do some great sandwiches and soups and things. The one thing that struck me (as a non-vege) is that the vegetarian menu is really excellent — pretty much all the breakfasts have complete vege options and quite a significant amount of the total menu is suitable for vegetarians. Not just the token bit of salad here!

The atmosphere of the cafe is very charming and quite bohemian. As you can see from the photos dotted around this page, the interior is decorated in a very bold style. There is original art on the walls and the occasional display from a local artist. The staff all seem to fit the place very well — the first time we visited, a particularly good song came on the radio so they turned it up and all sang and danced along!

In terms of exactly where the cafe is, I imagine that Google Maps and Multimap can explain it a lot better than I can. Although if you’re familiar with the area, it’s on Heaton Road which is parallel to Chillingham, just opposite the big Catholic church.

What Is This Site Then?

Essentially, it’s a fan site. It’s just slightly different in that the object of our obsession isn’t a celebrity or tv series or movie, but rather a place. The food at Belle & Herbs is absolutely wonderful — and we love good food. Elly and I originally found the cafe when we were up in Newcastle househunting. Since we’ve moved up to our new house in Heaton, we’ve spent a fair few lazy weekend mornings trying out various items on the menu. Then whenever someone came to visit, we had to show off our favourite cafe. They were similarly excited. We also noticed that there are a LOT of regular customers at Belle & Herbs, so we figured we weren’t the only ones who thought it was great.

We’d already been taking photos (with my cameraphone) of just about every meal, because they looked so good (and we were showing off to certain friends of ours who bitch about being a hundred miles from a decent cafe). So when we decided to start this site, we had plenty of photos to share already!

So What Is The Point Exactly?

Our intent is to try and document every item on the menu at Belle & Herbs. We welcome anyone else who also wants to contribute … the more the merrier! 🙂

FAQs

“I tried this cafe you’re always on about … and now I want to rave about it too! How can I contribute?”

Well, firstly, you just sign up — there’s a link on the frontpage or for your convenience there’s also one right here where you can register. Once you’re a member, then you can write a draft post — one of the regular contributors will review it within 24 hours and usually approve it, else we’ll get in touch with you to let you know why not. This is largely a spam-prevention measure, but I’m sure you realise it’s important.

“Are there any rules?”

There aren’t any rules per se, but we do have some posting guidelines. Most of this are to keep us out of hot water, so we’d appreciate it if you’d follow them.

“Are you being paid to do this?”

Categorically, no. We are in no way affiliated with Belle & Herbs. This is not some clever viral marketing idea of theirs (although I imagine they might wish they’d thought of it 😉 ) — we really are just fans of the place, who like to share our experiences of the food there. What you’ll get here will be real reviews of the Belle & Herbs experience — when it’s good, when it’s bad, when it’s a bit slow and when it’s downright fantastic too!

UPDATE: In January 2007, we added Google Adsense to the site, just to help pay for the bandwidth costs. Rest assured, however, the income is minimal!